Task 1: Identify the basic elements in a game of your choice.

Figure 1.1: A screenshot of The Sims 4 gameplay. Image source: YouTube.com.

1. Name: The Sims 4 (Simulation Game)
2. Actions: Players choose and customize characters to play. The characters can be fully customized in many aspects, including names, genders, ages, personalities, clothes, ambitions, life goals, skills, and many more. Players control the character(s) from a third-person view by clicking on objects in the game and selecting actions from the provided options. Players in this game can also buy, sell, build, and decorate houses for their characters. Long story short, players live the lives of their characters in the game. (Figures 1.2–1.3)
3. Goals: No linear end goal! The goals vary depending on the players’ preferences. They can include, but are not limited to, achieving the characters’ life goals or dreams, making the characters rich and famous, getting the characters married and building a family, building and decorating fancy houses, and replicating cities, countries, or places in the game.
4. Rules: No fixed rules! Depending on the players, they can set their own rules to make their experiences more fun and challenging. For example, I might set a rule that my character must be rich and famous before reaching adulthood.
5. Objects: Fully customizable characters and houses, hundreds of functional and interactive objects (almost all the objects in the game), the characters’ biological needs, the progress of the characters’ life goals or achievements, and the characters’ wealth, to name but a few. (Figures 1.4–1.5)
6. Playspace: 3D, real-world-like landscapes and environments. (Figure 1.6)
7. Players: Single-player and multiplayer.

Figure 1.2: A screenshot of character customization in The Sims 4. Image source: YouTube.com.

Figure 1.3: A screenshot of house construction in The Sims 4. Image source: YouTube.com.

Figure 1.4: A screenshot of action options for controlling characters in The Sims 4. Image source: YouTube.com.

Figure 1.4: A screenshot of some functional and interactive objects in The Sims 4. Image source: YouTube.com.

Figure 1.5: A screenshot of a map/environment in The Sims 4. Image source: YouTube.com.

Task 2: Swap one element between two games

What if we could live the life (of our customized character) and run the city at the same time?

This idea of integrating the life simulation game (The Sims) into the city-building game (Cities: Skylines) has been my wish for a very long time. Personally, I love playing both The Sims and Cities: Skylines, depending on my mood and vibes at the time. One of my favorite game elements in The Sims is its ACTION, which allows us to personalize the character we want to play. I actually always customize my character to be the best representation of me in as many aspects as I can (and the game allows). By doing it this way, I can experience myself in the virtual world, trying different things that I may not have done before in real life or seeing myself (through the character) react to different situations that occur in the game. Sometimes, I have a feeling that The Sims can be a little preview or a trial-and-error version of my life in some ways because The Sims makes me feel like I’m a real citizen living in the (virtual) environment, where sometimes I would love to redesign, manage, or run it (but The Sims itself doesn’t have that ACTION like Cities: Skylines does).

For Cities: Skylines, I love the way that we can be someone who plans, designs, manages, builds, and runs a city. However, we can’t customize any character or see our identity in the game since Cities: Skylines doesn’t have that kind of ACTION (like The Sims does). In Cities: Skylines, we can freely choose the maps (completely blank or partially built) and start building cities on the map. We can do everything as the one who runs the country, e.g., determining the city’s layout, zoning areas, adjusting taxes, enforcing laws and policies, and so on. It might sound fun and easy, but if we’re complete beginners, we may ruin the city or go bankrupt within minutes after starting the game.

If we add the ACTION of running a city from Cities: Skylines into The Sims, I think players, including myself, will definitely spend more hours on it. My idea is that we just add this city-building action as an additional element of The Sims, for example, by adding this action to one of the jobs that the character can work in: the mayor position. So, the play experience of The Sims won’t change much since the added city-building action will function only when the character gets into the assigned position/job. By doing it this way, players will have more options for actions, goals, and objects, as well as more play space to play with. If players would like to play the original game elements of The Sims or the added city-building action, they are free to choose through their characters. If this integration happens in reality, we can LIVE the LIFE and RUN the CITY at the same time. The characters in The Sims can redesign, manage, and run their city, and at the same time, the city will no longer be administered by someone unidentified but by a fully customized and personalized character.

Task 3: Space of Possibility of a Childhood Game

When I was little, I used to play a game called “Ma-Roon-Chiang” (in Thai: มะรูนเชียง). It was a kids’ game from Thailand, and most times we played it on a dirt field or in the schoolyard. I thought it was plain and easy back then. Even so, it was not always the same. What happened could change based on how the players moved, how they reacted, and how they worked with the other kids (Figure 3.1).

Figure 3.1: A picture of children playing “Ma-Roon-Chiang (In Thai: มะรูนเชียง) Image source: BURIRAM WORLD.

• Goals: The runners want to pass the defenders and make it to the far end without getting tagged. The defenders want to stop them. They try to block the runners and tag them before the runners get to the end.
• Actions: Players may run, halt, turn, or pause until the right chance comes. They can dodge the defenders and also coordinate with teammates. The runners can call out “Chuen (In Thai: เชิญ)” which means “invite.” They use it to ask defenders to step aside or to let them move into the next area. Defenders stay on their own marked lines. They try to tag the runners as they come near.
• Objects: The game has only a few things in it. Most of what you work with are the lines you put on the ground. Those lines make the separate zones and the routes players follow. You can draw them with a stick, a piece of chalk, or even just a small mark in the dirt.
• Rules: Two teams are picked at the start. Then one group becomes the defenders. The other group acts as the runners and tries to get through the lines. The runners must stay inside the play zone. They also need to avoid getting tagged. The defenders stay in their own marked areas. They try to block the runners from passing through.
• Play-space: People often play this game outside, like on a dirt patch or a schoolyard. You mark lines on the ground to show where the action should stay. Those lines also split the area into separate parts. Depending on how big the open space is and what shape it has, the game can feel harder or easier.
• Space of possibility: Even with simple rules, the game still lets players choose a lot. A runner can pick to go fast or slow down. They can also wait for a teammate instead of moving right away. On top of that, they may change direction. They might even act in a way meant to pull the defenders off their plan. The defenders face choices too. They need to decide where to stand. They also have to pick the right time to move. So the range of outcomes does not come only from the rules. It comes from how goals, actions, objects, and the play space all meet each other during the match.

The diagram maps one moment when a runner approaches a defended line (Figure 3.2):

Figure 3.1: A diagram showing a moment when a runner approaches a defended line.

When I was a kid, I liked Ma-Roon-Chiang (In Thai: มะรูนเชียง) for one main reason. The game was not hard to learn. Still, each round felt a bit different. What people chose and how they reacted kept shifting the next turn.

Task-4 a real-time game vs. a turn-based game.

I chose Cities: Skylines for the real-time part and Chess for the turn-based part. While the streamers kept going, I focused on how the board changed each turn. One game and the other work in very different ways, so it was interesting to see how one move could lead to fresh choices in one case, but not in the same way in the other (Figure 4.1).

Figure 4.1: A log of all the game states for the two games.

When I look at the two game state logs, the “space of possibility” seems different in each game. In Cities: Skylines, things keep shifting even if you are not making a big choice. You might place a road, but at the same time, citizens still travel, traffic patterns form, spending keeps happening, and new issues can show up. So one move can open up multiple outcomes. For instance, a new residential zone can raise the population, and it can also bring heavier traffic. After that, the game may demand more schools, hospitals, power, and other services.

In Chess, the board state feels more organized than in many other games. After each move by one side, the situation shifts right away for the other side. What you do with a piece can change what can be played next. A move might clear a line for another piece. It can also give a chance to take something. Sometimes it leaves a piece where it can be hit. Because of this, the “space of possibility” rises or drops based on where every piece sits.

I also saw that the core parts work in different ways. In Cities: Skylines, you are trying to run a city, so your choices are shaped by that target. At the same time, roads, buildings, and public services give you options, and those options are not all the same. On top of that, the game limits you with rules and a small budget, so some plans never make it past the planning stage. In Chess, the rules stand out more right away. Each piece can go only in certain ways, so the move set is clear. The aim of checkmating the other king pushes you to think about nearly every turn. Meanwhile, the pieces keep shifting on the board, so the next moves you can choose from change again and again.

This activity showed me that “space of possibility” is not fixed. That space shifts when goals, actions, objects, rules, and the play area influence each other. In Cities: Skylines, several of these shifts can occur at the same time, and some surprises show up. In Chess, the shifts follow a set turn order, so it feels easier to track. I can also see how what one player does leads to the next state for the other player.